Pete Buttigieg’s husband Chasten says first date was a ‘cute meet-cute’
Pete Buttigieg with his husband Chasten Buttigieg after announcing his presidential candidacy for 2020. (JOSHUA LOTT/AFP/Getty)
Chasten Buttigieg—husband of presidential hopeful Pete Buttigieg—has revealed how the couple’s first date took place.
Pete and Chasten married in June 2018, three years after they connected on the dating app Hinge.
“Our first date—it was actually supposed to be coffee, but I got stuck in rush hour traffic getting out of Chicago. So we moved it to dinner,” Chasten told Now This.
“When I pulled up in front of his house to pick him up, he opened the door and we both said ‘howdy’ at the same time.
“He opened the door and we both said ‘howdy’ at the same time.”
—Chasten Buttigieg
“Then we both said: ‘What? That’s my word.’ It was kind of a cute meet-cute.”
Pete Buttigieg met husband Chasten on Hinge
The couple first met in person in September 2015, bonding over a plate of Scotch eggs in a South Bend, Indiana pub.
“He said: ‘You’ve got to try these,'” Chasten, a junior high school teacher, told the New York Times for a 2018 profile.
“It was a kind of magical moment. I mean, sure, it’s a fried ball of meat with an egg in the middle, but when it came to the table my little Midwestern heart leapt.”
Pete Buttigieg kisses his husband Chasten after announcing his campaign. (Scott Olson/Getty)
After dinner the pair went to watch a local baseball game before taking a walk down the nearby St Joseph River.
As they headed back to the stadium car park, tentatively holding hands, post-game fireworks lit up the night sky.
“Literally, there were fireworks on our first date,” Chasten said. “It was kind of ridiculous, I know, but I was hooked.”
Pete Buttigieg polls third in presidential race
Pete is currently vying for the Democratic presidential nomination in a crowded field of candidates.
A poll by Morning Consult, published on Monday (April 22), put the South Bend mayor in third place behind the more established candidates Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden.
Should he win the nomination—and, ultimately, the White House—Pete would become the US’ first openly-gay president.
Chasten, who would be the first-ever First Gentleman, has already begun planning his ideal inauguration, joking that he would want Beyoncé to perform.
